He said to Anna, 'What time does this finish?'
She held up five fingers. 'You want to dance, Mister professor?'
'Later,' said Kelso. 'Maybe.'
'It's the Weimar Republic,' said O'Brian, coming back with two bottles of beer and a can of Diet Coke for Anna. 'Isn't that what you wrote? Look at it. Christ. All we need is Marlene Dietrich in a tuxedo and we might as well be in Berlin. I liked your book, professor, by the way. Did I say that already?'
'You did. Thanks. Cheers.'
'Cheers.' O'Brian raised his bottle and took a swig, then he leaned over and shouted in Kelso's ear. 'Weimar Republic, that's how I see it. Like you see it. Six things the same, okay? One: you have a big country, proud country, lost its empire, really lost a war, but can't figure out how - figures it must've been stabbed in the back, so there's a lot of resentment, right? Two: democracy in a country with no tradition of democracy
- Russia doesn't know democracy from a fuckin' hole in the ground, frankly - people don't like it, sick of all the arguing, they want a strong line, any line. Three: border trouble - lots of your own ethnic nationals suddenly stuck in other countries, saying they're getting picked on. Four: anti-semitism - you can buy SS marchin' songs on the street corners, for Christ's sake. That leaves two.
'All right.' It was disconcerting, hearing your own views so crudely parroted; like an Oxford tutorial -'Economic crash, and that's coming, don't you think?'
'And?'
'Isn't it obvious? Hitler. They haven't found their Hitler yet. But when they do, it's watch out, world, I reckon.' O'Brian put his left forefinger under his nose and raised his right arm in a Nazi salute. Across the bar, a group of Russian businessmen whooped and cheered.
AFTER that, the evening accelerated. Kelso danced with Anna, O'Brian danced with Nataliya, they had more drinks the American stuck to beer while Kelso tried the cocktails:
B-52s, Kamikazes - they swapped girls, danced some more and then it was after midnight. Nataliya was in a tight red dress that was slippery, like plastic, and her flesh beneath it, despite the heat, felt cold and hard. She had taken something. Her eyes were wide and poorly focused. She asked if he wanted to go somewhere - she liked him a lot, she whispered, she'd do it for five hundred - but he just gave her fifty, for the pleasure of the dance, and went back to the bar.
Depression stalked him. He wasn't sure why. He could smell desperation, that was it: desperation stank as strongly as the perfume and the sweat. Desperation to buy. Desperation to sell. Desperation to pretend you were having a good time. A young man in a suit, so drunk he could barely walk, was being led away by his tie by a hard-faced girl with long blonde hair. Kelso decided he would have a smoke at the bar and then go - no, on second thoughts, forget the cigarette - he stuffed it back into the pack - he would go.
'Rapava,' yelled the barman.
'What?' Kelso cupped his hand to his ear.
'That's her. She's here.'
'What?'
Kelso looked to where the barman was pointing and saw her at once. Her. He let his gaze travel past her and then come back. She was older than the others: close-cropped black hair, black eyeshadow like bruises, black lipstick, a dead white face at once broad and thin, with cheekbones as sharp as a skull. Asiatic-looking. Mingrelian.
Papu Rapava: released from the camps in 1969. Married, say 1970, 1971. A son just old enough to fight in Afghanistan. And a daughter?
My daughter's a whore...
'Night night, professor -' O'Brian swept past with a wink over his shoulder, Nataliya on one arm, Anna on the other. The rest of his words were lost in the noise. Nataliya turned, giggled~ blew Kelso a kiss. Kelso smiled vaguely, waved, put down his drink and moved along the bar.
A black cocktail dress - fabric shiny, knee-length, sleeveless - bare white throat and arms (not even a wrist watch), black stockings, black shoes. And something not quite right about her, some disturbance in the atmosphere around her, so that even at the crowded bar she was in a space, alone. No one was talking to her. She was drinking a bottle of mineral water without a glass and looking at nothing, her dark eyes were blank, and when he said hello she turned to face him, without interest. He asked if she wanted a drink.
No.
A dance, then?
She looked him over, thought about it, shrugged.
Okay.
She drained the bottle, set it on the bar, and pushed past him on to the dance floor, turned, waited for him. He followed her.
She didn't make much of a pretence and he rather liked her for that. The dance was merely a polite prelude to business, like a broker and a client spending ten seconds inquiring after each other's health. For about a minute she moved idly, at the edge of the pack, then she leaned over and said, 'Four hundred?'
No trace of perfume, just a vague scent of soap.
Kelso said, 'Two hundred.'
'Okay.'
She walked straight off the floor without looking back and he was so surprised by her failure to haggle that for a moment he was left alone. Then he went after her, up the spiral staircase. Her hips were full in the tight black dress, her waist thick, and it occurred to him that she didn't have long to go at this end of the game, that it was a mistake to invite immediate comparison with women eight, ten, maybe even twelve years her junior.
They collected their coats in silence. Hers was cheap, thin, too short for the season.
They went out into the cold. She took his arm. That was when he kissed her. He was slightly drunk and the situation was so surreal that he actually thought for a moment that he might combine business and pleasure. And he was curious, he had to admit it. She responded immediately, and with more passion than he'd expected. Her lips parted. His tongue touched her teeth. She tasted unexpectedly of something sweet and he remembered thinking that maybe her lipstick was flavoured with liquorice: was that possible?
She pulled away from him.
'What's your name?' he said.
'What name do you like?'
He had to smile at that. His luck: to find the first postmodern whore in Moscow. When she saw him smiling, she frowned.
'What's your wife's name?'
'I don't have a wife.'
'Girlfriend?'
'No girlfriends either.'
She shivered and thrust her hands deep into her pockets. It had stopped snowing, and now that the metal door had closed behind them the night was silent.
She said, 'What's your hotel?'
'The Ukraina.'
She rolled her eyes.
'Listen,' he began, but he had no name to ease the conversation. 'Listen, I don't want to sleep with you. Or rather,' he corrected himself, 'I do, but that isn't what I had in mind.'
Was that clear?
'Ah,' she said, and looked knowing - looked like a whore for the first time, in fact. 'Whatever you want, it's still two hundred.'
'Do you have a car?'
'Yes.' She paused. 'Why?'
'The truth is,' he said, wincing at the lie, 'I'm a friend of your father's. I want you to take me to see him -'
That shocked her. She reeled back, laughing, panicky. 'You don't know my father.'
'Rapava. His name's Papu Rapava.'
She stared at him, slack mouthed, then slapped his face -hard, the heel of her hand connecting with the edge of his cheekbone - and started walking away, fast, stumbling a little: it couldn't have been easy in high heels on freezing snow. He let her go. He wiped his mouth with his fingers. They came away black with something. Not blood he realised: lipstick. Oh, but she packed a punch, though: he was hurting. Behind him, the door had opened. He was aware of people watching, and a murmur of disapproval. He could guess what they were thin king: rich westerner gets honest Russian girl outside, tries to renegotiate the terms, or suggests something so disgusting she can only turn and run bastard He set off after her.